the tone of cool detachment has been his foreign policy hallm k hallmark. they are a catalyst present but not deeply involved. just to start you out on the huge threat of an iranian nuclear weapon, how does that factor into the second term? >> i think it's possible that this year there may be an action by israel against iran. it looked likely last year. i thought it was going to happen. and then it looked less likely. and people i'm speaking to think it is once again a possibility. that changes the entire dynamic. and this administration talks about wanting to shift to asia. sure, that sounds greatest. but i think it will be very difficult to do. especially in that happens. if the israelis decide after their elections that they are moving a little bit more to the right, if the iranian elections coming up bring that country even further to the right, it seems like some sort of clash is coming. that's just on the israel-iran. if you look -- broaden out a little bit, then you have syria, which is in state collapse, and is probably going to be in some sort of s